THIS WEEKEND In
the calm before the Hobbit storm, Jack Nicholson captured the number one
spot with his new comedy Something's Gotta Give
during a relatively slow session at the North American box office. Two
other new comedies, the Farrelly Brothers pic Stuck
on You and the teen tale Love Don't
Cost A Thing, both experienced mild bows but helped to shake
up the top five during the weekend before the hugely anticipated launch
of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
which brings its weapons of mass destruction to the box office charts on
Wednesday aiming to demolish some records in the process.

Jack Nicholson bumped his A Few Good Men
co-star Tom Cruise from the top spot as Something's
Gotta Give collected $16.1M over the Friday-to-Sunday span,
according to final studio figures,
to lead all films in the marketplace. Directed by Nancy Meyers (What
Women Want, The Parent Trap),
the PG-13 picture averaged a solid $6,001 from 2,677 theaters and gave
Sony its ninth number one opener of the year - a new industry record. The
romantic comedy, which earned mostly positive reviews, finds the evergreen
star playing a music industry executive who finds himself falling for his
girlfriend's mother. Diane Keaton, Keanu Reeves, and Amanda Peet also star.
Adult women were the primary audience as studio research showed that 68%
of the crowd was over the age of 35 and 59% were female.

In the three years between the Nancy Meyers bookend comedies What
Women Want and this weekend's Something's
Gotta Give, no female director has opened a film at number one
on her own. Vicky Jenson co-directed Shrek
which topped the charts in May 2001 and Sharon Maguire helmed Bridget
Jones's Diary which bowed at number two, but climbed into the
number one slot in its second weekend in April of the same year. Meanwhile,
for Nicholson, Something marks the
three-time Oscar winner's second trip to the top of the heap this year
after April's huge $42.2M debut of Sony's Anger
Management. Keanu Reeves, on the other hand, has hit number
one three times this year with his current film and both Matrix
sequels.

Last weekend's top film, the Tom Cruise epic The
Last Samurai, dropped a moderate 42% to $14.1M in its second
weekend of release. The $100M+ film has grossed $46.9M in its first ten
days and looks on course to reach the century club.

Comedy experts Bobby and Peter Farrelly saw their latest entry Stuck
On You open in third place with $9.4M generating one of the
worst bows ever for the writer/director brothers. Averaging a weak $3,134
in an ultrawide 3,003 theaters, the Fox release failed to reach the debut
heights of other hit comedies from the gross-out kings including $22.5M
for 2001's Shallow Hal, $24.2M for
2000's Me, Myself, and Irene, $13.7M
for 1998's There's Something About Mary,
and $16.4M for 1994's Dumb and Dumber.
The PG-13 Stuck stars Matt Damon and
Greg Kinnear as conjoined twins who move to Hollywood when one wants to
pursue his acting dreams. Reviews were generally lackluster.

Premiering in fourth place was the teen film Love
Don't Cost A Thing which grossed $6.3M from 1,844 theaters for
a mild $3,425 average. Starring Nick Cannon and Christina Milian, the PG-13
film was a multicultural remake of the 1987 teen flick Can't
Buy Me Love. The opening was about half of what Cannon's hit
Drumline grossed when it opened this
exact weekend a year ago to $12.6M and a $6,865 average. That Fox title
went on to collect $56.4M. Love, which
finds the actor playing a high school nerd who hires a popular gal to pose
as his girlfriend, was released by Warner Bros.

This weekend's box office delivered the lowest gross for a number one
film in over three months as ticket sales fell from the comparable frame
from each of the last three years. Industry health will change quickly
when New Line Cinema's The Return of the King
invades over 3,600 theaters with more than 7,000 total screens this week
with its Wednesday launch which begins with midnight screenings on Tuesday
night. Next weekend's only other wide release will be the Julia Roberts-led
femme pic Mona Lisa Smile which Sony
opens on Friday.

Three solid holdovers were close behind. Disney's Eddie Murphy comedy
The Haunted Mansion dipped just 35%
to $6.1M in its third frame boosting the cume to $53.7M. Miramax added
449 theaters to the run of its Billy Bob Thornton hit Bad
Santa and bagged $6M. Off only 14%, the R-rated adult comedy
has reached $35.7M and is showing some of the best legs of any film this
holiday season. Speaking of durability, New Line's Christmas-themed Elf
slipped only 25% to $6M as well and lifted its total to $147.5M after its
sixth weekend.

Universal's teen dance pic Honey
tumbled 62% in its second weekend to $4.9M. The $14M production has grossed
$19.8M in ten days and looks to reach $30-33M. Studio stablemate The
Cat in the Hat followed with $4.2M, down 42%, for a $90.7M sum.
Nine-digit territory awaits. Rounding out the top ten was Halle Berry's
Gothika with $2.7M, off 48%, giving
the Warner Bros. entry $53.9M to date.

Three films fell out of the top ten over the weekend. Fox's epic sea
adventure Master and Commander dropped
36% to $2.4M in its fifth mission and raised its total to $76.2M. With
a budget of over $135M, the Russell Crowe film looks to reach at least
$85M domestically with higher levels possible depending on Golden Globe
and Oscar nominations.

The British Christmas movie Love Actually
dipped 41% to $2.1M in its sixth weekend and has embraced $52.2M to date.
A domestic tally of at least $60M seems likely. Overseas, Love
has already grossed $90M and remains at the top of the U.K. charts for
the fourth consecutive weekend.

Ron Howard's Western thriller The Missing
crumbled 62% to $1.5M and saw its cume inch up to a disappointing $24.7M.
The Sony flop should end with just $27-29M.

Ahead of the mid-week launch of The Return
of the King, New Line bowed the special release of the extended
edition of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
and banked $727,645 from 126 theaters. The gross and $5,775 average bested
the $473,463 take and $3,758 average of the reissue of The
Fellowship of the Ring just one weekend earlier in the same
cinemas. Adding in the re-release sales, Fellowship
now stands at $314.2M while Towers
sits with $340.5M.

Opening impressively in limited release was Tim Burton's fantasy saga
Big Fish which bowed in just six theaters
but grossed $207,377 for a fantastic $34,562 average. The PG-rated tale
expands on Christmas Day and goes nationwide on January 9. Total since
its Wednesday launch is $281,795. Lions Gate opened the Colin Firth period
drama Girl With A Pearl Earring in
seven sites and grossed $89,472 resulting in a solid $12,781 average. Sony
Classics released the Michael Caine pic The Statement
in seven sites and grossed $37,220 for a not-too-promising $5,317
average.

Critically acclaimed films campaiging for end-of-year kudos also made
their mark. Focus Features' 21 Grams dropped
36% to $322,069 for a $4,352 average from 74 theaters and a total of $2.9M.
Fox Searchlight widened In America
from 11 to 47 locations and saw sales double to $275,435. With $803,254
to date, the distributor will expand the film to about 150 theaters on
Friday and to about 300 runs on Christmas Day.

The top ten films grossed $75.8M which was down 13% from last year when
Maid in Manhattan opened at number
one with $18.7M; and down 13% from 2001 when Vanilla
Sky debuted on top with $25M.

Compared to projections, Something's Gotta
Give opened a few notches below my $20M forecast. Both Stuck
On You and Love Don't Cost A Thing
debuted well below my respective predictions of $16M and $14M.

Take this week's NEW Reader
Survey on the opening gross of The Return
of the King. In last week's survey, readers were asked how much
the screener ban would have helped to prevent piracy. Of 1,649 responses,
13% said Very Much, 32% thought Somewhat, and 55% felt Not At All.

Be sure to check back on Wednesday
for a complete summary, including projections, for next weekend when The
Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and Mona
Lisa Smile battle it out for the top spot.

This column is updated three times each week:
Thursday
(upcoming weekend's summary), Sunday
(post-weekend analysis with estimates), and Monday
night (actuals). Data source: Exhibitor
Relations, EDI. Opinions expressed
in this column are those solely of the author.

Last Updated : December
15, 2003 at 6:30PM EST

Gitesh Pandya can be seen each Friday on "The
Biz" airing at 12:30pm and 9:30pm ET on CNNfn.